[Articles from Vanguard, October 1983]
Hail the 65th Anniversary of the October Revolution
On this, the 65th anniversary of the great October Revolution, let us draw some lessons from the history of the Bolshevik revolution. On this occasion we will examine the important role of ideology that paved the way for the success of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia. It was the consistent battle against all forms of deviations from Marxism, led by Lenin and Stalin that kept the Bolshevik revolution on the revolutionary path and pre- vented it from slipping into the morass of revisionism. Today, for revolutionaries in India, this is of primary importance, as revisionism in India had not only strangulated the communist movement for over forty years, but even after the historic Naxalbari uprising there is today a strong right deviation within the revolutionary movement.
Marxism tells us that history develops according to certain Laws and the task of the revolutionary is to understand these laws and act accordingly. If we understand the laws -of development of our society and act according to- it we will definately move towards success but if we are blind to those laws we will flounder from mistake to mistake. However intelligent we may be, society cannot be made to develop according to-our whims and fancies. That is why if we sincerely desire to take society forward we must understand the laws of development of society — this is what is meant by theory, which is the basis for revolutionary practice. That is why Lenin has said that, “without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement., This idea cannot be insisted on too strongly at a time when the fashionable preaching of opportunism goes hand in hand with an infatuation of the narrowest forms of the practical activity”. To understand the significance of this statement it is necessary to delve, briefly, into the history of the ideological struggle course of the Bolshevik revolution and the role of theory in the successful completion of the Bolshevik revolution,
Before, the formation of the K. S. D. L. P, (Russian Social Democratic Labor Party) it was the Narodniks that dominated the revolutionary environment. It would have been impossible to establish a proletarian party without a thorough fight against the Narodniks. Plekhnov, Lenin, and others undertook this. The struggle culminated in 1894 with Lenin’s book, “What the ’Friends of the People are and how they fight the Social Democrats”. This book criticized the world outlook, economic views, political platform and and tactics of Narodism. The final’ nail in the coffin of Narodism was laid by Lenin’s book “Development of capitalism in Russia”, which thoroughly refuted the Narodnik idealization of the peasant economy and laid the economic basis for an understanding of the stage of revolution, But with the defeat of Naro-dlsm and the growth in popularity of Marxism there grew within Russia a strong trend which propagated Marxism devoid of its class-struggle. This, ‘legal Marxism’, had spread like a cancer, not only in Russia but also in Europe. And together with ‘legal Marxism’, Economism grew as a widespread trend throughout Russia. They confined themselves to the struggle for economic demands. They declared that the working-class should begin its economic struggle by advancing the demand for the right to strike, then pass to the demand for the right to organize trade unions and only then cautiously approach political questions. They had their own political magazines, Rabochaya Mysl (Workers’ Thought) and Rabochaye Dyelo (Worker’s Cause) which extensively propagated their views. Lenin launched a consistent battle, first against ‘legal Marxism and then Economism. The struggle was first taken up against the ‘legal Marxists’ in the booklet. “The Tasks of the Russian Social - Democrats” which reiterated the importance of the underground forms of organization and the illegal forms of struggle. Then, taking cudgels against economism from the columns of Iskra (started on 11 Dec. 1900) Lenin culminated the attack with his two brilliant works ...... “Where to Begin” in 1901 and “What is to be Done?’ in March 1902. These two books are till this day an invaluable guide in our struggle against economism. With these books Lenin cleared up the political confusion, drew a clear line of demarcation between Marxism and revisionism and laid the ideological foundation for the formation of the party. The Party was finally born at its Second Congress (the actual dates of its foundation was 1898; but the entire C. C. was arrested a few weeks after its formation and the Party became virtually defunct), which was held, from 17 July to 10 Aug. 1903. But the internal struggle did not come to an end with the formation of the R, S. D, L. P., but in fact became fiercer. It was at this conference that a cleat division between the delegates emerged which finally coalesced into the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks. At this conference the most heated debate took place on the role, character and structure of the Party of the proletariat. In defense of his position on the nature of the proletarian Party Lenin wrote his famous book, “One step forward, two steps back” in May 1904. This book laid the ideological and organizational basis for the proletarian party, which was later adopted by the Third International, and which is, to this day, the basic book for Party organization. In matters of organization, this book brought out clearly organizational methods of the revisionists (seen even today) and those of the Marxists.
On the eve of the 1905 revolution, at the “3rd Congress of the Party, Lenin presented the important political and organizational tasks before the Party - - -.i e. the preparations for the organization of an armed uprising and the establishment of a provisional revolutionary government. Elaborating these tactics and giving it a theoretical substantiation, Lenin wrote one of his most famous books in June1905 which was to give the main political direction to the future course of the revolutionary movement in Russia....”Two tactics of Social Democracy in the Democratic Revolution’* presented, for the first time in the history of Marxism, the specific features of the bourgeois democratic revolution in the era of imperialism; its motive force and prospects. In this book, he subjected to devastating criticism the anti-Marxist, opportunist standpoint of the Mensheviks in questions of theory, strategy and tactics of the Party in the revolution and also those reformist leaders of the second international, whose support the Mensheviks enjoyed.
Yet, the fourth Congress of the R.S.D.L.P., held soon after the uprising, passed resolutions along Menshevik lines, as they were in a majority at the Congress (many Bolsheviks could not attend as they were involved in the armed uprising). But after the defeat of the 1905 uprising and the vicious onslaught of the Tsar, on the revolutionaries (Stolypin reaction), .the Mensheviks were utterly; demoralized, retreated in panic, renounced the Party’s revolutionary programme and urged the working-class to come to an agreement with the bourgeoisie. They demanded the liquidation of the illegal Party organization and the cessation of the illegal revolutionary activity...... by renouncing the Party’s programme, tactics and revolutionary traditions, the liquidators had hoped to secure police permission for a legal party.
While the Bolsheviks were involved in a desperate ideological battle to stem the tide of liquidationism, Trotsky came out with a centrist position for unity between the Bolsheviks and liquidationists and advocated unity on an unprincipled basis. Lenin showed, how in reality, Trotsky’s position was nothing but a camouflaged position of the Mensheviks and liquidationists. Trotskyism was particularly harmful as it covered up its opportunist substance with phrases about “unity”. Besides, ‘he formed a faction with leading echelons of the Party creating untold organizational disruption.
With this serious setback, organizational disruption and rampant confusion spread by the liquidationists and Trotskyites it became a fundamental necessity to re-assert the fundamental scientific principles of Marxism itself. It was in this period of utter confusion, that Lenin wrote his excellent philosophical work, “Materialism and Empiric-Criticism”. With this the Bolsheviks were able to beat back the attacks of the bourgeois ideologists and revisionists on the very basic tenets of Marxism.
Finally, this two-line struggle within the Party resulted in the expulsion of the Mensheviks at the sixth AH-Russia Conference of the R.S.D. L. P. in 1912. With this the Bolsheviks were able to unite their ranks more firmly, but the struggle for a correct line continued uninterruptedly. Finally, it again got acute on the eve of the insurrection when two central committee members, Kamenev and Zinoviev, opposed the call, and, in fact, leaked the plans out to the police. Yet the correct proletarian line prevailed, resulting in the earth shattering victory of the Bolsheviks and the establishment of the first socialist state in the history of mankind in October 1917.
But with establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat the ideological struggle did not end; in fact, it became more acute. With victory, a large number of opportunists had sneaked their way in to leading positions within the Party and the ideological battle became very fierce. As Lenin pointed out, “the dictatorship of the proletariat means a most determined and a most ruthless war waged by the new class against a more powerful enemy, the bourgeoisie, whose resistance is increased tenfold by their overthrow (even if only in a single country), and whose power lies, not only in the strength of international capital, the strength and durability of their international connections, but also in the force of habit, in the strength of small-scale production. Un fortunately, small-scale production is still widespread in the world, and small-scale production engenders capitalism and the bourgeoisie continuously, daily, hourly, spontaneously, and on a mass scale. All these reasons make the dictatorship of the proletariat necessary, and victory over the bourgeoisie is impossible without a long, stubborn and desperate life-and-death struggle which calls for tenacity, discipline, and a single and inflexible will”.
After the death of Lenin, Stalin defended the proletarian revolutionary line against all sorts of opportunists, disruptionists and revisionists. Throughout the period of socialist construction there continued a fierce struggle for a correct line.. It was a seesaw battle with the bourgeois line making desperate bids to dominate the proletarian line. Finally, with the death of Stalin the bourgeois line prevailed. With this the first socialist state was turned into a capitalist state and has now grown into an imperialist super power seeking world hegemony. With this international proletarian movement suffered a setback in the long march towards communism.
On this, the 65th anniversary of the Great October Revolution we must draw lessons from this, big setback, never forget the importance of ideology in advancing the revolutionary movement, and never hesitate to wage a life and death struggle against revisionism.... whether it raises its head from the international plane or the national plane or the from within the very Party itself. Anyone who desires to make revolution must remember this every day, every hour, every minute. To emphasize this point let us quote yet once again from Lenin who said, in ‘What is to be Done’, that “Engels recognizes not two forms of struggle for social democracy (political and economic), as is the fashion amongst us, but there, placing the theoretical struggle on a par with the first two.”
POLITICAL NOTES
INDIRA INVITES ‘BEAR’ HUG
On 21 June 1983, Yogendra Sharma and Venkataraman left by the same plane for Moscow. Yogendra Sharma was a Central Committee and National Council member of the Communist Party of India (C. P-1.) ; he was the leader of the CPI in the Rajya Sabha, he was also the editor of the weekly ‘Mukthi Sangarsh’ and the monthly ‘Communist’, and above all, he is an agent of Indtra Gandhi within the CPI. (His links, if any, with the notorious KGB are yet to be discovered). Venkataraman 5s the Defense Minister of the Union of India.
Two hours before Yogendra Sharma’s departure from his home to the airport, an unsealed envelope was delivered to him, which carried a message from Indira Gandhi to Yuri Andropov. The message requested the leader of the CPSU to put pressure on the CPI in order to force it toe the line of the Congress (I). In other words, Indira Gandhi directly requested a foreign power to interfere in the internal affairs of our country.
That she was unsuccessful was quite another matter her intentions show that she has not hesitated to use the assistance of a foreign power to subjugate even so impotent an opposition as the CPI. One can imagine to what extent she will go in using the assistance of this foreign power, if there was a truly revolutionary opposition, or a revolution against her despotic rule. Under such circumstances, it is obvious, that she would not hesitate to go beyond verbal pressures and would even go to the extent of calling in the services of the armed forces of another country, if her position were really threatened. Such is the traitorous, comprador and anti-national character of the Indian ruling classes and their chief representative. The letter asked Andropov to personally interfere and guide the ‘left parties’ to take more ‘progressive stand’. But Sharma, who carried the letter, was more than a mere post man; he was supposed to have detailed discussions with top Soviet officials, including Ulyanovsky, who wrote an article last December in a Soviet paper, hailing Indira Gandhi as the main progressive force in the sub-continent, The question still being raised is why had an opposition party member have to carry the message when a senior member of Indira Gandhi’s own cabinet was traveling to’ Moscow on the same day! ! !